Laptops, desktops, and accessories benchmarked for real-world use.
The 15-inch MacBook Air M4 is the laptop we recommend to almost everyone in 2026. After 5 months of testing, we measured 17h 22m of real-world battery life, fanless sustained performance that still beats most 13-inch Windows laptops with fans, and the most reliable keyboard and trackpad combo at this price. The 8GB base model is still a trap, but a 16GB/512GB config at $1,299 is the easiest laptop recommendation we've made all year.
The Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 5 Pro is the best $749 Windows laptop we've tested in this generation. After 4 months of daily use, we measured 11h 06m of real-world battery life, a 16-inch 120Hz panel that hits 372 nits with reasonable color accuracy, and Lenovo's signature keyboard at a price the MacBook Air can't touch. The fans are audible under load and the SSD is the slowest of the bunch in this price tier, but at $749 these are tradeoffs we can live with.